IR cameras are used as tools within different industries and services. The IR cameras are used for measuring the temperature of different objects or sites. As IR cameras are getting more widespread, the needs of IR camera users have come more in focus. Users of IR cameras have a need for keeping record of, for example, notes and observations taken in the course of capturing IR images. Such notes may for example concern circumstances, observations of facts or deviations from expected results of thermography inspections or thermographic measurements. Today, it is common to take notes on paper to make a preliminary documentation of observations or deviation reports. The notes are then usually transferred to a digital format by manual input to a computer application program that couples the notes to the corresponding IR images. These kind of notes coupled to images are commonly called annotations.
The IR camera devices on the market today have the ability to let the user enter predetermined types of data into the camera via a text input function in the IR camera itself or via an application program running on a computer. This possibility to enter data of a predetermined data type into the IR camera using the text input function on the camera facilitates for the user to make annotations to images. However, the input functions for entering annotations that are known today require that the user in advance has determined and created a predetermined structure of input fields and also predetermined the possible type, content and values that are allowed to be input in each field.
There is a need for a more flexible and user friendly input interface for entering annotations, an input interface that can be adapted by the user and also adjusted according to the needs of the user in a more flexible manner compared to the input functions present in the IR cameras and IR image application programs known today.